The present invention is generally related to cellular telephone systems and more particularly to an improved packet-switched cellular telephone system having packet-switched radio channels.
In the prior art cellular telephone systems, a voice channel is assigned for the duration of a telephone call between two parties. Since both parties are continuously listening, either can ascertain that the discussions have been terminated and hang up, thereby freeing up the voice channel for another call. Similarly, when making a data call on such prior art cellular telephone systems, a voice channel is assigned for the duration of each data call. However, data calls may include long periods of inactivity during which a radio channel is needlessly tied up. As a result, radio channel spectrum is wasted and data calls are relatively expensive. Accordingly, there is a need for an improved packet-switched cellular data telephone system for efficiently accommodating data calls.